


Another Train (Building Worlds That Don't Exist Remix)

by wintercreek



Category: due South
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-21
Updated: 2011-04-21
Packaged: 2017-10-18 11:36:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/188514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wintercreek/pseuds/wintercreek
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>We crawl in the dark sometimes and think too much / Then we fill our heads with crazy things that only break our hearts</em></p><p>A different train, a different phone call.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Another Train (Building Worlds That Don't Exist Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Greensilver (Trelkez)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trelkez/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Night Train](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12571) by [Greensilver (Trelkez)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trelkez/pseuds/Greensilver). 



> Thanks to Isis and Luzula for betaing.

The house was utterly still, save for the ringing of the telephone. Fraser winced and hoped the noise wouldn't wake Ray. They were enjoying a rare weekend alone together, the rest of the Vecchios having decamped to Florida for their annual trip. Far from the debauched days Ray's eyebrows had suggested, their Saturday had turned into a lazy day of rest. Now, at midnight, Fraser had wandered downstairs for a glass of water and found himself confronted with an intrusion on their retreat.

It was tempting to ignore the phone, but that wasn't how he'd been raised. Finally, he lifted the cordless handset and said softly, "Vecchio residence."

Whoever was on the other end drew in a sharp breath.

Fraser waited. When the silence continued, he prompted, "Hello? If you're speaking, I'm afraid I'm unable to hear you. You might hang up and try the connection again–"

"Ben."

He'd know that voice anywhere. "Victoria." Fraser threw a glance up the stairs, straining his ears for any indication Ray was awake. There was none. "Where are you?" he asked, low and urgent. Whether he was asking in order to arrest her or join her, he couldn't have said.

Her laugh was harsh; it always was. "You know I can't tell you that. You'll just run to that cop boyfriend of yours and cause me trouble."

"How–?" Fraser began, setting down his glass.

"You're answering the phone, at his house, in the middle of the night. I knew you'd fall into bed with him, once you couldn't have me." Victoria sounded impatient now.

"How did you know I would be here, I was going to ask." Fraser fidgeted, eyeing the doorway but discarding the kitchen as a venue for this conversation. The porch was also unrealistic, with winter still icing the steps each night. And he didn't want to leave the foot of the stairs, somehow.

Victoria scoffed. "Where else would you be? And how else would I call you, when you don't have a phone?"

Fraser raised an eyebrow. "What would you have done if R– if Detective Vecchio had answered?"

"Hung up, of course. Prank call, wrong number, take your pick of explanations." She fell silent, and when she spoke again her voice was softer. "I just wanted to hear your voice. I miss you, Ben. Surely you can understand that it's worth some risk."

He swallowed hard, and with an effort he said nothing.

"You could still come to me, you know." Victoria's voice was coaxing. "A rendezvous point, an unknown intermediary to meet you there. It could be so good. _We_ could be so good, together." She waited, and he said nothing. After a minute, she continued, "You don't belong there, stuck in that uniform and tied to all those expectations. They don't appreciate you. You're nothing but a symbol to them, the perfect Mountie."

Fraser's fingers tightened on the handset until the plastic creaked faintly. He sat down on the stairs and leaned his forehead on his free hand.

"You were going to do it," Victoria said, insistent. "You were coming with me, you were finally doing what you wanted and not what everyone else expected. You think if you lead this dutiful life someone will recognize it and appreciate you, but Ben, they won't. The world's not going to give you anything you don't take for yourself." As she finished, her voice sounded as if she were pleading with him, and Fraser had a flash of her years ago on the trail out of Fortitude Pass.

"I can't," he managed. It was barely a whisper.

She heard it anyway. "You can. I'll tell you where to go. I know you want to. I know you love me. Don't tell me it's not true." She fell silent, leaving the line open for his answer, and Fraser could hear the whisper of something too regular to be static and too soft to be rain. It was snowing where she was, coming down hard by the sound of it. It fit, somehow; Victoria was always, in his mind, standing amidst the snow. He pictured her, curls falling forward over the pay phone's handset. He could see the way she'd cup the mouthpiece. The way she'd ward off other passengers, out for a smoke break, without ever seeming furtive. The snowflakes landing in her hair and hissing on the handset ever so faintly. He remembered her outstretched hand and the way his feet had pounded that Chicago platform. His heart pounded in the same rhythm, then and now.

"Come with me," Victoria said, and Fraser almost didn't know whether he heard her speaking or the echo of her call as she reached to him. His chest felt tight.

Fraser found himself, God help him, standing and reaching out to open the door, ready to step into the night and go to her. He felt dazed, hypnotized, compelled. "Victoria, I—" he began, one hand resting on the cold metal of the doorknob. He was interrupted by the creak of a stair: the step just above the landing, where the staircase turned.

Fraser looked up and saw Ray standing there. His face was painfully open, braced for loss yet still hopeful. Stepping back from the door, Fraser locked eyes with Ray. _Choose me, Benny,_ Fraser could almost hear him saying. _Love me more. Stay with me._ No guns, no force this time. It felt as if they stood there forever, Fraser's hand fallen to his side, Ray's knuckles white on the banister. The only sounds were their breathing, and the murmurs of other people coming over the phone, and finally Victoria's rough huff of breath.

"Ben, come on," Victoria said. "I have to go. If you're coming–"

"No," Fraser broke in. If he went with Victoria, he'd never make his own choices again. She'd use him like a pawn; she'd never choose him over herself. And there was Ray, silent but almost certainly aware of who was on the other end of the phone, waiting. Just waiting.

It should have been a wrench to push the button and disconnect the call. It would have been, a year ago. Even six months. But now— Fraser thumbed the phone off and dropped it back in its cradle, dropped himself back onto his stair. He could hear the wood groan faintly as Ray stepped down to him and sat, wordlessly, one stair up. He placed a hand on Fraser's shoulder.

"Ray, I—" Fraser said, helpless to explain.

Ray's hand squeezed his shoulder. "I know, Benny. It's okay. You're here now."

Outside, it started to snow, the susurration of a late storm sweeping suddenly over the roof. Fraser wondered if it was the same storm he'd heard on the line, if Victoria was so very near. It didn't matter, not really. He stood and offered Ray his hand. "Let's go back to bed."

**Author's Note:**

> Title, parenthetical, and italicized summary text from "Another Train" by Pete Morton.


End file.
